O ye of little faith
by IncredibleInnocence
Summary: In which an exhausted Keith loses hope from the futility of fighting in the ten thousand year old war...and Lance is sick. Excerpt: In the end, they were just seven people, backed by aliens from a few war-torn planets, fighting against an enemy that had been in power (and working to stay in power) for the last ten thousand years.


"Keith please...I just need a minute." Lance hunched over, resting his hands on his knees as he panted.

Keith watched him with barely concealed anxiousness. Every second they wasted lessened their chances of escape. He had to fight the urge to shove Lance down the corridor in front of them.

But Lance...he was clearly at his limit. He'd been breathing raggedly for the past half an hour, and his face had gone from flushed red to worryingly pale. Keith feared that if he pushed him more, he would collapse. Then, they'd definitely be caught.

"Okay. Okay, let's go." Lance straightened, subtly swaying. Keith's heart clenched. The pallor hadn't left his face but his eyes burned with determination.

So on they ran. To get back to their waiting teammates on the other end of the galra battleship. 

Infiltrating the ship to damage the controls was supposed to be the crazy difficult part. They accomplished it in under an hour. Turns out getting out unscathed was what they really had to worry about.

No one had anticipated that the ship would have a self-defence system set up. It put the whole aircraft under lock down and high alert the moment it registered the tampering.

Pidge was only just barely able to prevent the ship from trapping them inside. It had taken some highly impressive, very panicky hacking.

She had given them a clear path of escape. All they had to do was run down it. Only...Lance was ill. He'd just recovered from a bad fever prior to the mission.

Unfortunately, war waited for no one. As the sharpshooter, Lance was needed. He had to go. But clearly, he wasn't as recovered as they had thought.

Keith's heart pounded painfully in his chest. From the exertion of running for his life. From rage at this ten thousand year old war that forced him and his (dare he say it) friends into this life of soldiers. From fear of running into the Galra soldiers. But most of all, it thudded with worry for the sick teammate running just behind him.

The exit had to be near. Lance couldn't take much more of this. 

As if in response to his thoughts, Lance stumbled. Keith heard him trip and whipped around just in time to see him fall to his knees and slump into the wall.

Keith's heart stopped.

"Keith. Lance. I'm tracking you. You're nearing us! Don't stop!" Pidge's agitated voice sounded in his earpiece.

He pushed it to the back of his mind, as he crouched down to support Lance's back and neck. He lightly tapped his teammate's cheek, noticing with no small amount of alarm that it was burning.

To his utter relief, Lance stirred and opened his eyes. The darkness under his eyes screamed exhaustion. Keith had never related to anything more in his life.

"I know you're tired, but we're still in the Galra ship. We're almost out, Lance. But you need to get up, I can't carry you out. Please."

Lance wordlessly found his feet with Keith's support. There was no energy to spare for words.

They ran.

As soon as Lance saw the lions and castle, he slumped bonelessly into Keith's arms, utterly spent.

Hunk came out to help drag him the rest of the way. 

As the castle wormholed away, Keith found himself staring blankly at the window, watching the destroyed battleship wink away from view.

The mission was a success. There were no casualties, no permanent injuries.

But Keith couldn't help wondering if it even mattered in the grand scheme of things. It had only been one ship. Was this all Voltron could do? Take out the Galra battleship by battleship, evading the whole army and rescuing the odd prisoners along the way?

In the end, they were just seven people, backed by aliens from a few war-torn planets, fighting against an enemy that had been in power (and working to stay in power) for the last ten thousand years.

Would anything they do even change anything? What was the point of it all? All the fighting and risking their lives. All along, had they been fighting a war they couldn't win? 

Lance groaned in discomfort in his sleep. Keith took the cloth from his forehead and rewet it in the basin beside Lance's bed.

Lance's breathing stuttered and Keith quickly lifted him into a sitting position, letting him lean backwards into his chest, easing his breathing.

As he held Lance, a lone tear ran unbidden down Keith's cheek. He left it there. It didn't matter. Nothing mattered anymore.

The one consolation, Keith thought as he drifted off to sleep, was that after the Galra defeated them all, they would finally be able to rest.


End file.
